


In The End

by starspangledsprocket



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, End Game, End Game fix it, F/M, M/M, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Sacrifice, Time Travel, kind of anyway
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-13
Updated: 2019-03-13
Packaged: 2019-11-16 15:36:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18097172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starspangledsprocket/pseuds/starspangledsprocket
Summary: They would do anything to save the Universe from what Thanos had done.Anything.





	In The End

**Author's Note:**

> my dear, sweet baby rvmikofujikawa over on Tumblr has been waiting patiently for this for over a month, and I just want to say that I am an awful person and I hope that they like it. 
> 
> Hope y'all like it, too!

When the snap happened, Steve realised that he really hadn’t understood the true magnitude of everything that had been lost. The following days acted as a tally, on which he kept adding the names of friends, of colleagues, of politicians, of… of everyone they had lost. Everyone _he_ had lost.

Bucky, Sam, Wanda, Vision, T’Challa and his sister, Scott Lang, Groot. Later, he found out that Pepper Potts, Maria Hill and Fury were also gone. So many people. So many lives snuffed out in the blink of an eye, in the click of a finger.

And then there was Tony.

Nearly all of his friends – the people who kept him sane in this time period when all he wanted to do sometimes was scream – were gone, and yet all Steve could think about was a man that wouldn’t even speak to him after the Accords. Steve stuck by what he had done, by his beliefs, but he couldn’t help but feel guilty over the execution. If only Tony had _listened_ to him, rather than automatically disagreed with everything he had said just because it was _him_ , maybe they could have sat down and come to a compromise.

Steve wasn’t stupid enough to believe he would have agreed to a discussion had Tony suggested it at the time, but hindsight was twenty-twenty.

What Steve couldn’t stop thinking about was that, regardless of the Accords, regardless of everything that had happened, Tony hadn’t even stopped to think before hurling himself into battle against Thanos’s goons. Steve had seen it on the news; Tony had thrown himself onto that ship without pause to try and save the world.

Steve had been hiding in a motel.  

And now Tony was dead. Maybe it had been the snap, maybe he had been obliterated by Thanos himself, but if he were alive Steve knew they would have heard from him by now. Earth’s best defender, snuffed out like so many others.

Or so he thought.

His day started like no other; he woke at six, went for a jog around the Facility’s perimeter, and once he was back inside he blared the morning’s news through his suite while he showered. There was never anything new to hear; more people dead in riots, another government toppled, suicide rates quadrupling. Every day the same. Every day just a little bit worse. 

He had just stepped out of the bathroom with a towel around his waist when suddenly Bruce came bursting through his door. He had the decency to flush a little with embarrassment once he realised Steve was half naked, but ultimately looked too rushed to really pay it any mind.

“Sorry, I – I should have knocked,” he started, before immediately continuing. “I was just down in the lab, and – and there’s a message from Tony.”

Steve didn’t immediately understand.

“Is it the footage of him rambling about Star Trek? He used to send them to the group chat – but I suppose you were AWOL at the time, so you –“

“No, no, Steve –“ Bruce was practically bristling with adrenaline. “The message came through this morning.”

Steve stilled. “Was it… timed? Scheduled?”

Bruce shook his head. “Live.”

Steve inhaled sharply. “Show me.”

They both turned to the door, excitement radiating from them both, before Steve suddenly stopped in his tracks.

“What?” Bruce asked, immediately concerned.

“I should probably put some clothes on first,” Steve muttered sheepishly.

“Oh.”

\---

_“Just for the record, being adrift in space with zero promise of rescue is more fun than it sounds… Food and water ran out four days ago. Oxygen will run out tomorrow morning. And… that'll be it.”_

Steve listened, shocked and horrified in equal measures, as Tony’s weak voice crackled through the Iron Man helmet. It was disconcerting, really, to see the helmet speak as though a person were still in it, even though it was very much an empty shell.

_“Nebula keeps handing me this weird black juice that smells like diesel; I think she’s joking with me, but yesterday I drank some anyway. Tasted like ass. I don’t feel… quite so hungry anymore, though? I might be going insane. Nobody’s even going to get this message – I need to stop – “_

And just like that, the message cut out. Steve stared at the helmet for a moment longer, not really sure what to do with himself, and then he finally took a deep breath.

“Can we… he didn’t give us co-ordinates, but could we track this message?” he asked, but even as he said the words, they felt impossible.

“We don’t have the technology to track the message directly,” Bruce shook his head, “but he has to be close. The suit only has a limited reach, so if it’s picking up the message it means Tony’s got to be nearly home.”

“How limited is the reach?” Steve asked, cogs starting to turn in his head.

“I wouldn’t dare to say,” Bruce sighed. “Tony’s a genius, but even he’s limited by the technology of today. He really can’t be that far away at this point.”

_That far_ could mean a number of things, though. Space was colossal, unforgiving, and Steve – now he had physically heard Tony’s voice – couldn’t bear to imagine him slowly choking to death from lack of oxygen, or starving to death, right outside their atmosphere.

He wasn’t going to lose anyone else.

“We start patrolling, then,” he decided. “We have some working Quinjets – they can make it past the atmosphere –“

“Steve…” Bruce was already shaking his head.

“- we keep going until we find him – no, Bruce, don’t –“

“Listen to yourself,” Bruce argued quietly. “Think about what you’re saying.”

“I _am_ thinking!” Steve snapped. “This is Stark we’re talking about! He’s made it all this way by himself – if we can help him, we have to!”

“You’d waste all of our resources for one man?” Bruce asked. “I love Tony, but –“

“Now we know he’s alive, he’s the best chance we have of reversing this thing,” Steve argued stubbornly. “He’s our best shot. We have to find him.”

Bruce stared at him for a moment, and Steve got the distinct impression he was seeing right through him, but after a second he simply sighed and shook his head.

“You’re the boss,” he conceded, but he didn’t look happy about it.

Steve didn’t care. This was a lead – this was _something_ that they could do that might help reverse the situation they were in. He wasn’t stupid enough to convince himself that it would work, but… a small part of him desperately hoped it would. If they could get Tony back – if they could get the _team_ back – then together they could come up with some way to save all the people they had lost.

They just had to find Tony.

“I’ll take first patrol,” he decided, already moving towards the door. “Tell the others the plan. I’ll keep in touch and be back in a few hours.”

Before Bruce could say anything else that would only make Steve mad, he ducked out through the door and headed for the hangar at the back of the facility. It was a beautiful day, all things considered, and for a moment Steve marvelled at the fact that the sun could still shine and the Earth could still spin when half of its population was gone.

And then he saw the crashed spaceship in the middle of the lawn. Tony really _hadn’t_ been that far away.

“Holy shit –“ Steve cursed, ducking through the hangar doors.

He didn’t really know what to do, and found himself running towards the crash site before really making a conscious effort to do so. There was a person – a blonde woman – circling around the ship, scratching her head as though she were confused, and Steve thought that maybe she was the Nebula that Tony had been talking about, or –

And then there he was. Appearing from the rubble on extremely unsteady feet, Tony Stark set foot on planet Earth for the first time in weeks. He looked dazed, bewildered, and had to rest a hand on the woman’s shoulder to steady himself for a moment. Another woman exited what remained of the ship after him, and Steve had to rub his eyes for a moment because… because she was entirely blue. And also looked like a robot.

Steve was starting to wonder if he was hallucinating.

“Hey!” the blonde woman called, having just spotted Steve skid to a halt in the middle of the lawn. “Hey, you! Friend or foe?”

“ _Steve_?” Tony croaked, spotting him too.

Steve went running again. He didn’t stop when the blonde woman put her fists up, and he didn’t stop when the blue woman stepped in front of Tony protectively; he barged through them both and wrapped his arms as tightly around Tony as he dared.

He was incredibly thin and felt brittle in Steve’s arms. After a long second, Tony lifted his arms and wrapped them around him, too, and in that moment Steve felt like everything was really going to be okay. They were together, and regardless of what had happened, regardless of the Accords, they were going to fix this as a team.

And then Tony passed out in his arms.

“Oh,” was all Steve could manage.

\---

Tony cried a lot over the next couple of days. He cried when he first saw Rhodey, cried when he learned what had happened to Pepper, cried when Natasha hugged him, cried when he had his first cheeseburger, cried when they added Peter Parker, Steven Strange, Peter Quill, Drax, Gamora and Mantis onto the list of those they’d lost.

It was really hard to watch.

The one thing they didn’t do was speak about the Accords and Siberia. If anything, it seemed like Tony was doing his very best to avoid any conversation that would cause an argument – something that was very unlike him. Steve supposed that he was just so traumatised, so happy to be back on Earth, that he was doing his level best to keep everyone who remained as close to him as possible. Steve knew exactly what that felt like, and could absolutely respect Tony’s intentions.

In fact, with them both making a conscious effort not to rile the other up, Steve found that they actually had far more in common than he had initially thought.

Tony loved to read, of example. Not e-books, either – he loved to hold a physical book in his hands. Steve found him more than once, in a quiet moment, just running his hands over the spines of his large collection, as though he was silently telling himself that now he’d have time to read them, that the stories were still there, that _he_ was still there.

Tony also loved to cook. In the first few days after his return, he was rarely found anywhere other than in the kitchen, cooking or baking the most delicious smelling meals. Again, Steve could see trauma peering through, almost an obsession, as Tony gorged himself on huge, hearty meals. He knew what it was like to go hungry, could see his childhood self in Tony as he stuffed pasta and bread and all sorts of things into his mouth, but he could also see it becoming a problem if it wasn’t monitored.

Tony wasn’t happy about the diet, Steve could tell, but Bruce explained that his body needed time to adjust back into its normal habits, and he seemed to buy that. It wasn’t a lie, Steve reasoned with himself, even as he determinedly didn’t look at Tony’s pouting face. The urge to find a blanket and wrap him up in it had become somewhat of a norm for Steve, and the only way to stop himself from doing so was to ignore or avoid him when he pulled faces like that.

“Been stuck in space for weeks trying to stop Mr. Blobby taking over the world, and now they won’t even let me finish my gateaux,” Tony mumbled, tipping his dessert into the trash.

He still looked thin – thinner than Steve had ever seen him before – but not quite as gaunt. There was colour in his cheeks that hadn’t been there when he’d first arrived back, and a spring in his step that was starting to reappear for the first time. He was home; that really was the best medicine anyone could ask for.

“- gonna go and buy a whole box of doughnuts and eat every single one in front of them,” Tony was still grumbling under his breath as he loaded his plate into the dishwasher. “Gonna put Star Trek on and eat five pints of ice cream all to myself; everyone can suck a _dick_ –“

A rumbling siren cut over the rest of his sentence, and they stared at each other for a moment.

“Was that… did someone just press the buzzer at the gate?” Steve asked, brow furrowed.

“Yeah,” Tony nodded his head.

They stood there for another moment in silence, before, as one, turning to the door at a sprint. Steve beat Tony to the security office, but Natasha was already there when they ducked inside. She had CCTV footage up on the screens lining one wall, flicking from one angle to another, to another in her search for whoever was out there.

“There,” Tony hummed quietly, pointing to a screen in the top left corner of the room.

On it, a man was waving desperately up at the camera. For a moment Steve didn’t recognise him, and then realisation slapped him in the face and he took a shocked breath.

“That’s Scott Lang!” he blurted out, hitting a couple of keys on the command centre to blow the image up bigger. “How –?”

Natasha hit a couple of buttons that turned sound on, and for a minute they just stood in silence, listening to what Lang was saying.

“- we met in Germany, remember? Ant-Man? I know you know who I am, guys, c’mon! I also grew really big? Passed out? I – y’know, whatever, doesn’t matter; I kinda need your help.”

“Is this an old message?” Steve asked, and Natasha shook her head.

“It’s live.”

“Then get everyone suited up,” Steve replied. “This guy is supposed to be dead.”

\---

Seeing everyone (or everyone they had left) suited up made Steve feel better than he had in a very long time. It reminded him of who they had lost, certainly, but it also showed him how strong they still were, what a great team they still had.

It made him feel powerful – like he had a purpose. The world was ending, billions were gone, but he could still lead his team.

“Open the gate,” he instructed into his earpiece, and one of Tony’s many AIs complied.

Metal rattled as the gate slid back into place, and Steve could only imagine the imposing image they must have made, stood in a line, ready to attack. Lang looked like he was about to soil himself when he caught a look at them all.

“Um… hi, guys,” he managed with a weak wave. “So… I’m in kind of a pickle.”

“FRIDAY, scan back through HUD recorded feeds and see if we have any weird alien shit going on here,” Steve heard Tony mumble from beside him. “Is this guy human?”

There was a small pause, giving Steve time to realise – really, properly realise – that Tony had been in space. He had seen alien species, other planets, and that… Steve couldn’t even imagine. It must have been terrifying and awe-inspiring in equal measure.

_“Scott Edward Harris Lang,”_ FRIDAY helpfully relayed to all of them via earpiece. _“Caucasian, human male –“_

Steve heard more than a few sighs of relief.

_“- He’s definitely himself, boss, but… there’s some weird radiation coming off him,”_ FRIDAY continued, as curious as Steve imagined an AI could sound.  

“Weird how?” Natasha asked.

_“He’s giving off a similar radiation signature as Doctor Strange,”_ FRIDAY replied.

“The wizard,” Tony explained, as though none of them had seen the footage of him flying around New York with glowing green hands.

_“Lang is human, certainly,”_ FRIDAY continued, _“but whatever he’s soaked in certainly isn’t.”_

“So what does that mean -?”

“Guys? Are you… will you help me, or…?” Lang cut in, taking an awkward step forward.

Everyone else took a step back.

“Is the radiation dangerous?” Tony asked quickly.

_“Other than a slightly elevated heartrate, Lang seems fine,”_ FRIDAY concluded. _“I think he just genuinely needs help.”_

“Just because he needs help doesn’t mean he’s not dangerous,” Steve muttered, but stepped forwards all the same and held his hand out for Lang to shake. “You’re supposed to be a dead man.”

“I… really?” Lang asked. “A lot of stuff has been going on, and I… well, when I got back I came straight here. What’s… _happened_?”

Steve glanced at the others, not really sure where to begin.

“You better come inside,” he sighed. “Start from the beginning.”

“Sure, um, can I pull my truck inside, or – never mind, I’ll just leave it here.”

\---

“Ok, this is going to sound crazy –“

“I’m fairly certain we can handle it,” Tony deadpanned.

“Okay,” Lang rang his hands and glanced around the conference room for a moment, as though he was trying to figure out where to begin. “Okay, so… I’ve been travelling in time.”

He was met with stunned silence.

“And…” he continued, “turns out that I’m not great at it and I don’t totally know how it works, because I ended up in 1985, and then the future, and then I’m pretty sure I saw a dinosaur, and then –“

“Hang on,” Bruce interjected. “How is this possible?”

“Oh!” Lang laughed. “Yeah, so my, um, buddy Hank and his wife made this machine that shrinks you so much that you can get into the Quantum Realm –“

“Strange mentioned something about that,” Tony mumbled. As he spoke, his knee brushed Steve’s under the table; Steve did nothing to stop it.

“Yeah, sure, so – but the Quantum Realm is super dangerous, and the last thing Janet told me was not to get trapped in a time loop down there,” Lang continued. “Turns out I’m not so great at listening, either, because when they wouldn’t answer me on the comms link I… kinda panicked and got trapped in a time loop.”

“They were taken by the Snap?” Thor guessed quietly.

“I guess so,” Lang replied. “What’s, uh, the Snap?”

“While you were stuck in the Quantum Realm, Earth was attacked,” Steve explained with a heavy sigh. “The whole universe was. A being called Thanos collected six powerful gems and used them to eviscerate half of all living things. He called it mercy, but…”

“But it’s genocide,” Tony spat. “And we’re going to get them back.”

“Oh…” Lang nodded his head. “Okay, yeah, but how’re going to –“

He paused.

“You want to use a time loop, don’t you?”

“If we can harness it’s power, point us in an agreed trajectory,” Bruce began, already nodding his head, “we can go back and warn ourselves, or stop this from happening, or –“

“If we find and destroy the stones before Thanos can get to them, we could easily kill the sucker,” Rocket butt in. “Just zap his purple ass out of existence.”

It was a plan. They had been without one for so long that Steve felt lightheaded with the possibility. It would be dangerous, and damn near impossible, but it was a plan. Steve knew his team, and now they had even more members than they had before. They could do this.

They could do this.

“Where’s the Quantum machine?” he asked, and felt Bruce and Tony bristle with excitement. They could read him, and they knew his question meant he agreed with them.  “How do we play this?”

“Oh, it’s in my truck outside,” Lang replied. “You want me to pull it in?”

“Yes,” Steve nodded, getting to his feet. “Let’s finish this.”

\---

Tony, Bruce, Carol and Lang formed their own science division. Carol had a startling knowledge of space, and – aided by Rocket – they managed to make a map of where all the Infinity Stones had been hidden. From there, they researched and field tested the Quantum machine until they’d successfully managed to jump through time to within a second of when and where they wanted to be.

In the meantime, Steve and the others were thinking tactically. They didn’t know how to destroy the Infinity Stones, but if they could collect them all and somehow use them to defeat Thanos first, then they’d have time to figure out how to destroy them afterwards. Steve planned their route, starting on Earth and then branching out further and further into space. The concept was terrifying, and he didn’t know how Tony had done it and kept his mind, but what kept him going was the thought that they were going to get everyone who had disappeared back. They were going to save them all.

It took a few weeks, but finally they were all prepared. Honestly, Steve took an extra couple of days to go over everything personally just to buy them a little more time; the closer they got to being ready, the less ready everyone seemed to be. They were still raw from the trauma of everything that had happened, and where there was now hope, there was also terror that their plan might not work.

But they were going to _make_ it work.

“Is this really going to work?” Natasha asked him in a quiet moment one evening, on the eve of their final trip.

“It has to,” he replied with a sigh, “because I don’t know what we’re going to do if it doesn’t.”

He chose the team that would be going back in time – himself, Lang, Carol and Tony. In the early hours of the day they had set as their departure, he roused them all from their beds and had them gather in the conference room.

“We can’t all go,” he told them, “because that’s too many variables that could mess with time. I’ve chosen you to come with me because I believe we’re the best chance at making this work, but it’s going to be dangerous – deadly, even. If you don’t want to risk that, there’ll be no hard feelings, but you should make it known now.”

He paused and glanced at each of them.

“I always knew you’d be the death of me,” Tony rolled his eyes, but there was a spark of life in them that Steve hadn’t seen for years. “Of course we’re all coming.”

Carol and Lang nodded in agreement, and Steve felt himself smiling.

“Okay,” he took a deep breath. “Get suited up, then. We’re doing this now.”

\---

The started with the Time Stone. Tony knocked on the door to Doctor Strange’s Sanctum and greeted him like he’d known him for years. Strange looked momentarily startled as they all swanned past him, but then a glazed look passed over his face and he sighed heavily.

“I’m dead,” he proclaimed, and Tony shrugged his shoulders.

“Not dead, per se, just… evaporated,” he replied. “And we’re trying to stop that from happening. Also, it’s rude to look into the future while you have guests.”

“Douchebag,” Strange muttered under his breath, but he was already ascending the stairs. “Wait here – I’ll go get the stone. _Don’t touch anything.”_

They waited for a moment in silence, and then Lang said, “Anyone else think that was way easier than we thought it was going to be, or –“

As he spoke, he leaned against a plinth and managed to knock over an ancient-looking pot. It clattered to the ground and shattered; they stood there in shocked silence, staring at the remains.

“Oops?” Lang tried, already trying to cram the shards under a rug.

\---

With the Time Stone in tow (and Strange’s yelling still ringing in their ears), they bounced to their next time and place: Asgard. Thor had told them that Heimdall protected the Space Stone, that he was the only one who could see through Loki’s tricks properly, so they headed straight to him.

Just like Strange, he seemed to realise why they were there. Steve was glad; he was done with explaining – now was the time for action.

“Keep it safe,” was all Heimdall advised as he passed the stone to them.

They had been keeping the Time Stone in a magical bag that Strange had given them so they didn’t have to touch them with their bare hands. Carol held open the bag and let Heimdall drop the stone inside. They glowed together for a moment before going dark, but Steve didn’t question it. He knew how much power was in that little pouch already.

“We will,” Carol promised him.

\---

Carol handled the Power and Reality Stones. She seemed to know half of what they came to understand as the _Nova Corps_ , and they were only too happy to help once she explained to them what was at stake.

The Reality stone was a little more difficult, as The Collector who was keeping it wasn’t at all happy about parting with it. After Carol transferred what Steve assumed was an atrocious amount of money into the Collector’s account, however, he seemed to loosen up a little bit and handed the stone over.

“A very rare thing,” he informed them, as though the didn’t already know. “Precious.”

Not the word Steve would have used for it, but whatever.

They turned to leave, only to find Tony staring into one of the many cases of goods the Collector was hoarding.

“Tony?” he called. “It’s time to go.”

Tony looked at him, and then silently pointed to whatever was in the case. Steve took a step forwards, and felt the breath leave his body once he realised what Tony had found.

Thanos’s gauntlet. It was just sitting there, gathering dust, as though it wasn’t the vessel for the most powerful weapon in the known universe.

“We have to take it,” Tony murmured. “If we put the stones in it, maybe we can use the power to destroy it from the inside out.”

“We could also loose control and destroy everything,” Steve countered, but his argument sounded weak even in his own ears. “We shouldn’t…”

“Please,” Tony whispered, looking down at the ground.

It was the first time Steve had heard him say please.

“We need to destroy the whole thing,” he continued. “That’s the only thing that can hold all that power and not burn up – we have to use it to destroy the stones.”

Steve knew he was right. It was the best chance they had of ending this once and for all. They could collect the stones, but without the gauntlet there was no way of harnessing the power for long enough to turn it inwards on the stones themselves. The gauntlet could do that.

“Okay,” Steve nodded, and smiled sadly when Tony looked up at him with surprise. “I don’t always disagree with you, you know.”

Tony’s expression was hard to read, but after a moment it was gone as he moved past Steve to head towards Carol – but not before gripping Steve’s shoulder for a long second.

“Hey, Carol?” he called. “If you buy this, I’ll Venmo you the cash when we get back, huh? You know I’m good for it.”

Steve took a deep breath, then followed him over.

\---

They hadn’t thought this through. They really, _really_ hadn’t thought this through.

After a run in with the Red Skull that Steve was sure was going to emotionally scar him for years to come, they finally came to the location of the Soul Stone.

_How_ had they not thought this through?

“We have to sacrifice something?” Lang asked incredulously as they all stared down into the depths of the pit in front of them. “Um… what?”

Steve didn’t know what to do. The Skull had told them a sacrifice was the only way to find the stone, and though he didn’t want to believe him, he knew it had to be true.

“There has to be another way,” Carol reasoned. “I could fly down and see if it’s in the bottom –“

“You fly down there, you’re not coming back out again,” Tony cut her off. He had a strange expression on his face again as he turned to Steve. “Steve –“

In that moment, Steve realised what he meant to do.

“No, no way –“

“ _Steve_ ,” Tony insisted, already taking a step towards the pit. “Come on –“

“No!” Steve yelled. “No, no way! We are not going to sacrifice ourselves –“

“You said that if we weren’t up for this, to back out,” Tony reasoned quietly. He was balancing right on the edge of the pit, and looked so small. “I’m right here.”

“Tony, no,” Steve ordered, but Tony wasn’t backing down. “We can find another way –“

“You can’t back down now,” Tony shook his head. “We knew what we were getting ourselves into. I – I can do this, alright? I can do this, and then you have to go save the universe –“

“We won’t be able to get you back!” Steve hissed, stepping towards him. “Everyone else will come back, but you –“

“Will have saved them all,” Tony insisted quietly, and then took a deep breath. “This… it’s okay, Steve. Really. I should have died in Afghanistan, should have died of palladium poisoning, should have died a million times before now. I was never meant for more than this.”

“I –“

“Don’t,” Tony shook his head. “Don’t make this harder than it needs to be.”

And then he pulled Steve towards him and kissed him.

For just a moment Steve didn’t know what to do, but it felt right, and he wrapped his arms around Tony to hold him close, kissed him back, and let the world fall away around them.

It ended too soon.

“Save them,” Tony whispered against his lips, pecked him one last time. “ _Save them_.”

“Tony –“ Steve tried weakly, but it was already too late.

With a final, bravely cheeky salute, Tony took a deep breath and threw himself backwards into the abyss. He was gone in a silent second, and Steve felt a rushing in his ears as he dropped to his knees and let out a strangled scream.

There was nothing for an eternity, and then a single, sparkling stone rose from the darkness and landed neatly at Steve’s feet. He stared at it, numb, and barely noticed Carol step forwards to quickly scoop it into the bag.

Tony was gone.

“I believe you have something that belongs to me,” came a booming voice from somewhere behind them, startling Steve right out of his sudden grief.

Turning, he came face to face with Thanos. He looked smug, as though he knew exactly what they had just sacrificed, and took a hulking step towards them.

“Give me the stones.”

“I’m good,” Lang, of all people, replied, flipping his mask down and grabbing for Carol and Steve. “Guys, let’s jet!”

He hit a button on his suit before Steve could even turn to get one last look at the pit where Tony had fallen; the last thing he saw as they were jettisoned somewhere into time was Thanos’s ugly face sneering back at them.

“I’m going to find you, little Terrans.”

\---

They landed back in the Facility. It looked the same, and for a moment Steve was struck dumb by how normal everything was.

And then Doctor Strange was there.

“I’ve gathered everyone together,” he told them. “This world isn’t the same one you left, but, for now, everyone who Thanos snapped is back.”

A collective sigh of relief left them, but Strange waved it off.

“It isn’t over yet,” he warned them. “Vision still has the mind stone, and Thanos is on his way to take back what he believes he’s owed.”

“Steve?” called a voice, and Pepper, of all people, appeared in the doorway. “There you are, oh – where’s Tony? Doctor Strange explained to us what you’ve been through, and…”

Steve didn’t know what to tell he. He knew she could see what had happened because her face changed immediately. Everyone was there but Tony, and they all looked as though they had been dragged through hell backwards. All he could do was shake his head to confirm what he knew she must be suspecting, and she nodded her head and swallowed back what looked to be a lot of tears.

“I see,” she croaked. “Was it at least –“

“He’s the reason we have the soul stone,” Carol told her, holding up the bag of stones. “It’s his soul.”

Pepper stepped forwards and cupped the bag tenderly, though she didn’t look inside. Instead, she looked to Steve. Something on his face must have translated, because she gripped his elbow with one hand and cupped his face with the other.

“Okay,” she nodded, even as tears ran down her face. “So we finish what he started, huh?”

Steve nodded his head. “For him.”

“For him,” she agreed.

\---

Shuri managed to extract the Mind Stone from Vision’s head mere seconds before a thundering boom shook the walls and Thanos appeared on the lawn outside.

“It’s time!” Steve yelled to everyone.

They were all there – the Avengers, the Guardians, Strange, Wakandans. Everyone that could possibly help was there, standing together in their uniforms.

Everyone but Tony.

“Where is my gauntlet!” they heard Thanos scream, and quickly scrambled for the closest exits to stall him while Steve and Carol stayed behind to attach the stones.

“How’re we going to do this?” Steve felt no shame in asking.

“You have to wear it,” Carol insisted, and Steve looked at her incredulously. “Don’t give me that look. You’re the one that has to end this.”

“I can’t –“

“Of course you can,” she cut him off. “You told him you would.”

It was an incredibly low blow, but one that Steve knew was necessary. He thought of Tony for just a second, sacrificing his life so that they could save everyone else, and found himself lifting the gauntlet before he’d really made the conscious decision to do so.

Everything was already going to hell when they got outside. Even without the gauntlet, Thanos was incredibly powerful, and even the Hulk didn’t seem to be able to quite get the better of him.

“My gauntlet!” he screamed as soon as he spotted Steve, and surged towards him.

Steve took a deep breath, and then, without really thinking too hard about what was about to happen, he slid the gauntlet onto his arm.

The power was immediate. He felt himself screaming, but couldn’t hear the sound coming from his mouth; his vision immediately disappeared, replaced by an intuition he wasn’t sure he knew the origin of. He was everything and nothing all at once, power and lack thereof, and knew he would quickly get lost in the sensation if he didn’t focus.

With all the effort he could muster, one word fell from his lips.

“Thanos.”

The effect was immediate. He could feel the gauntlet working, eradicating every inch of Thanos from the universe. His very existence was disappearing, as though he had never been born at all, and Steve found himself laughing with joy as he realised that this was it – this was the end. He had done it; they had done it.

Thanos was gone.

But between the joy, he realised there was still something he needed to do. The universe wasn’t safe until the gauntlet was gone, and though it felt incredible, he knew that it, too, needed to come to an end. As though it were a sentient thing, something jolted in his head and he thought he heard the stones screaming – but maybe that was just him. His whole existence started to hurt, and he could feel himself start to tear apart.

And then Tony’s face appeared.

It was all he needed to double down, to focus all his remaining energy on turning the stones inwards, on destroying them with their own power. He knew exactly the moment he had done it, because something broke in his mind and everything started to fall apart.

He died knowing he had saved the universe.

\---

He met Tony in a park. Logically, he knew he was dead, and they weren’t really in a park, but it didn’t really matter, somehow. Tony was sat on a bench, waiting for him, and that was what mattered.

“Hey,” he smiled, taking a seat beside him. He held out a bunch of flowers that had suddenly appeared in his hand. “These are for you.”

Tony rolled his eyes, but took the flowers all the same. “You kiss a guy one time and suddenly you’re stuck with him for all eternity.”

Steve grinned goofily. “It was a pretty good kiss. Not so great circumstances, but ten out of ten for the actual kiss.”

Tony smiled, but for a moment it was sad. “Yeah, we… we were pretty stupid about everything, huh?”

“I guess,” Steve agreed. “But it doesn’t matter now.”

“No,” Tony nodded, and then paused. “Did you -?”

“They’re all safe,” Steve told him. “We did it.”

“Good,” Tony sighed. “That’s… all I ever wanted.”

“Me too.”

They sat in an easy silence for a few moments, just basking in the warm sun and beautiful surroundings.

“So this might be a little bit presumptuous, seeing how you just died,” Tony started, “but do you maybe wanna spend the rest of time with me?”

Steve smiled uncontrollably. “I think I could deal with that.”

“Good,” Tony nodded, grinning back at him. “Good.”


End file.
